Stretching Issue 4 - The Triceps
Firstly some news. After terrible photos of myself doing each of these stretches we have swapped to using pictures from Bob Anderson's Book “Stretching”. This book is a fantastic resource for anyone looking to learn more about the details of stretching, or simply looking for a a variety of different stretches to include in their regular routine. It is well worth adding to your library and can be found in most good book stores, alternatively just let us know if you have problems finding it.
This Issue we are tackling the muscles that oppose the guns, the triceps. As the name suggests the tricep muscle actually has three heads. One of the heads connects to the scapula, or shoulder blade, and the other two connect to the ulna, one of the two bones in the forearm.
The tricep muscles can represent an important muscle to be conscious of in massage as when trigger points exist in this muscle the referral pattern can be quite wide reaching. This can include from the back of the shoulder through the obvious areas in the back of the arm into the lateral side of the elbow. When the pain impacts the lateral side of the elbow it can often be mistaken for tennis elbow.
The triceps as a muscle represent up to two thirds of the bulk of the arm. So for anyone keen to put a few more inches around the diameter of the arms this is one muscle where some really quick gains can be made. Just as interestingly as we age this is, along with the abdominals, are one of the muscles that lose muscle tone very quickly and easily.
So when we look at the positions of these attachments we see that the muscle has a number of functions in the body.
Firstly, it allows elbow extension, this is the same motion as straightening your arm after having done a bicep curl.
Secondly, it allows shoulder adduction. This is where you brings your arms back to your side if you were standing with your arms out to either side of the body, parallel to the floor.
Finally, it allows shoulder extension. Shoulder extension is the motion your arm does when standing straight and raising your arm up behind you by rotating at the shoulder.
There are a number of ways we can stretch this muscle depending on which head of the muscle we want the emphasis on and how much of the side of the body we want to stretch as well. For this exercise however we are going to focus on a fairly standard tricep stretch that works all three of the heads and doesn't really impact other areas of the body too much.
Firstly standing straight raise the arm that is to be stretched above your hand and reach down between your shoulder blades. Reaching over with the other arm push down on the elbow while pushing back with your head to really keep the focus in the tricep muscles.
As with any stretch, this should be held for approximately 10 – 15 seconds and repeated 3 times.
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Eric is one the massage therapists at Passion4Health in Browns Plains. He has obtained his Certificate IV and is currently studying his Diploma of Remedial Massage. Eric is passionate about all forms of body work and in additional to undertaking a short course in acupuncture is looking to continue on to Physiotherapy on completion of his Diploma.
Eric has a long background of involvement with sport including competitive martial arts at both national and international standards. This flows through to his treatments with clients which includes a lot of both passive and active stretching as part of the massage to eliminate muscular tension and improve flexibility and range of motion.